Alarming

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

That was the sound I woke up this morning. At 5am.

The only thing worse than being woken up extra early after a long evening of studying is hearing that noise reverberate through your room for the next ninety minutes. I laid in bed with a pillow over my head, but there was no escaping it.

It was awful. At first I thought it was our building's alarm going off because it was so loud but none of the emergency lights were flashing. I called the front desk just to be sure, and they said it was coming from somewhere else, but did not know where. Were we being attacked? Bombed? Was this some kind of tornado weather warning?

I was finally able to fall asleep after lying there for an hour, and when I woke up, I tried to find any information. The local news outlets inquired with the Department of Energy Management, who said it was a house alarm over a mile away. BS. There is no house alarm that loud, that goes off for that long. The news even followed up with the Department later and they were sticking with their story. Suspicious, no?

Then DCist talked to 311, who said that it was a maintence issue at the University District of Columbia. Finally, DCist updates with a letter from the City Council and UDC: The alarm was not promptly silenced because it is not part of the University's systems. It appears that the alarm may be part of a Municipal Civil Defense.

May be a part of? And good thing that the city has a municipal civil defense system that it does not know how to work and that residents know how to respond to. At least they knew it worked because people a mile away could hear it.

Personally, I think that the alarm was part of Intelstat, a monstrous "satellite company" across the street from my apartment and UDC. I use irony quotes because my friends and I are convinced that it is a government coverup. Before you think I am conspiracy theorist or watched too many episodes of Alias, I will note that out of this huge company, I have not seen more than a few people come outside. The place takes up a whole block and is located right next to the Chinese embassy. I am still convinced there was a security breach that set off the alarm and the government was covering it up by calling it a house alarm.

I am hoping they disable the whole thing because if this happened the morning of an exam, I would go crazy.